TANGLED WEB: A round-up of what's online and on our minds

Published on July 30, 2007.

Have you always, in your heart of hearts, had a burning desire to play music but the good Lord didn't think to bless you with any demonstrable talent with instruments? Well, 47-year-old gun shop owner Gerry Phillips took that lemon and made lemonade–with his hands. That's right, under the classy moniker of "Gunecologist," Phillips has put his palm music on YouTube for the world to enjoy. From the Tijuana Brass' "Spanish Flea" to the theme from the Star Wars cantina to ACDC's "You Shook Me All Night Long" to A-Ha's "Take On Me"–Phillips can hand-fart all the hits. There's even a helpful tutorial for any ass-piring hand-farters looking for some tips. We've been trying to perfect Loverboy's "Working For the Weekend" but keep oversqueezing the chorus.

So you've seen Al Gore's movie and bought multiple copies of every "green issue" any magazine has ever done. Hell, you might even drive a Prius and shop at Whole Foods with designer cloth bags. It all depends how dedicated you are to the global warming issue as a mass consumer. But did you know that every time you're using Google to ..um, google something like kittens or viking helmets or high-powered light sabers, you're actually needlessly wasting precious energy? It's true. According to the folks behind Blackle.com, a new search engine that basically is Google with a black screen. A simple gimmick that, according to them, saves up to 750 Megawatt hours per year. Don't believe the hype? Goog...er, Blackle the statistics and find out.

Nike's had a mixed past with skateboarders over the years–from the award winning "What If We Treated All Athletes The Way We Treat Skateboarders?" spots to creating a whole new brand–the now-defunct "Savier"–to being viewed as just another corporate interloper. But more recently, Nike took the grassroots, more low-key approach skateboarding, landing credible skaters like Paul Rodriguez, Gino Iannucci and more to slowly build it's credibility within the skateboarding community. Now the sports giant is about to make its debut in the hallowed domain of the skateboard film with Nothing But The Truth.